What love looks like

Matthew 18: 12 (NRSVA)

¹² What do you think? If a shepherd has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountains and go in search of the one that went astray?

This is what love looks like...

Empty streets

Empty beaches

Notes pushed through letter boxes offering help

Staying home so that key workers can travel to work

Making phone calls

Putting lights and teddy bears

and rainbows in our windows

expressions of connection and of hope.

Maintaining and strengthening relationships virtually

Meeting online

finding new ways

to be creative and to stay connected

new ways to notice and draw attention to

the love of God manifest in myriad acts of love.

Love is also

noticing the signs of spring that refuse to be shushed

even through pandemic

Welcoming the progress of the seasons,

the buds that are awakening

the blossom bursting forth

the birdsong that heralds the morning

the growth that continues regardless

promising something beyond,

that awaits our emergence from the storm

and mirrors the growth of love

worked out in practices

that transform communities

as, together, we face our fears

and weather them in love.

This is what love looks like.